New H2O piping in old house

Dave_23

Folks, I have an older 1920 Michigan house, wet plaster, uninsulated walls, brick exterior veneer. I have a couple second floor runs of galvanized steel pipe, which are almost fully clogged on the hot water side. I'd like to avoid damaging plaster. Any suggestions on what methods and materials can be used to repipe the runs? Running up exterior walls is out due to cold winter temps. Thoughts?

Unknown

I`m still a copper pipe

guy, and to me this sounds like a run of the mill re-pipe job.
You should NEVER run water(or heating) pipes in outside walls anyway!
Can you remove the old galv. risers and run new copper in the same holes from the basement?
This will likely involve some floor cutting, and with some soft copper you may avoid damaging much plaster at your fixture risers.
While your at-it, check the old drain piping too, and if need be replace that also.
Best of luck.

Dave

bob young

box & soffit

you might be able to run it exposed in a corner & insulate it and finally box it in.

Jamie Hall

I used to be...

a strictly copper guy for water pipes but...

I have recently had a major job of replacing galvanized iron plumbing in an old National Register historic house, where damage to the plaster was simply not acceptable; not even a little bit.

Worse, the plumbing vertical runs went up over (yup) a stone interior foundation, leaving me about 6 inches of play in which I could have dropped the galvanized, cut off 6 inches, dropped the galvanized, cut off 6 inches... and so on.

I was able to slip half inch PEX in in the space left in the chase around the galvanized (dropped a fish tape in from the top, pulled the PEX back up). Worked just fine. Left the old galvanized in place, just disconnected (which will puzzle the dickens out of the next guy, but that's his problem).

Saved me a LOT of time...

Unknown

im with Dave on this one

I'm with Dave on this one, never run any pipes in outside wall, I don't care how much you think you can insulate the limited space you have. Run it up inside closets and box it of for sound proofing, etc

Mark Custis

Jamie

I always though a TV show on this old HVAC system would be cool, but we are mostly all here so no money it doing it.

I have copper everthing, but potable and low temp hydronics. The bad guys do not steal pex. It is fast and it works. We would get "slammed for workmanship" pics, but no leaks, no problem.

Charlie from wmass

I still like copper but time is money and money is money so pex would be the choice sadly. Just does not look nice with pex. The question is though how are the waste lines? may have to open the walls after all. even if I were to use pex I would still open the walls as you do not know what is in there as far as hazards for the new pipe no matter the material.

Rich Kontny_3

PEX is proven

I remember the same comments about plastic DWV systems in the 70s. Now it is the norm. Pex has so many advantages due to its flexibility. If you compare the labor costs and the fact that there will be less joints with pex there is no debate.

I just did a pex repipe in a 90 year old home last week. We had to only open up the walls on the top floor. We used the galvanized to pull the pex.

In the twelve years I have been installing Wirsbo I had two leaks. One was a scratched sealing surface on a fitting and the other was a piece of wood debris that fell into a joint.

Once you use the pex you will find many practical application for it

Pex will not freeze and break it wil expand with the ice (unlike copper)